The Taiji Dolphin Slaughter Continues

The following is a blog by Hayden Panettiere of The Whaleman Foundation/Save the Whales Again! Campaign.

Hayden and other activists in Taiji’s bloody waters

I’m writing this with a heavy heart. I just learned that today in Taiji, a pod of 50 pilot whales were slaughtered, exactly 2 years to the day that I personally witnessed the brutal slaughter of a pod of 50 pilot whales including mothers and their newborn babies… and the images and horrible memories of that day are now flooding back into my mind like some sadistic nightmare version of Groundhog Day.

I received the sad news from Leslie-Ann Gervais who had traveled to Taiji by herself and witnessed the carnage earlier today. I can’t tell you how dangerous it is to go to the cove when the fisherman are there and to be there alone, I can’t even fathom that. Here is what she witnessed:

“Last evening I was walking past the Whale Museum… when I passed a man sleeping in a car facing the cliff of the lookout point towards the cove. Immediately it gave me a bad feeling….then I turned the corner of the cove and discovered a pod of Pilot Whales trapped in the nets…with two men guarding the area.

I decided to walk up the cliff to get a better look at the situation. There was now a bus driver parked taking a smoking break-so i would scream loud enough for him to hopefully hear me if anyone was up there waiting to get hostile. Half way up the stairs I heard the bus pull away. As soon as I got to the top I noticed it had been even more blocked than before. Even the path I found at the end of the fence had been blocked. There must be surveillance cameras up there. I climbed a tree and then stepped on a fence they put up which completely collapsed-oh,oh, the fisherman are going to be mad! I had a feeling the area would be booby trapped- I was right… There is barb wire ankle high tied between trees… My camera is broken and it’s a good thing I don’t have it with me , otherwise the barb wire could slice right through someone if they are walking fast and not looking down which is exactly what I did the last time!

Now I was poking every step before me with a stick…these guys are serious…then I heard a noise, in retrospect it could have been a bird…but whatever it was it terrified me, and I took a quick glimpse out onto the killing cove…guesstimating there are over 50 this time. I even saw a baby!

Even though I have no camera on me I feel I need to be present to show them that eyes are watching….

After a very restless night, I left around 5am to go back to the cove. When I arrived the fisherman had already killed about half the pilot whales and I watched helplessly as they killed the rest including the babies… there are no words to describe how I feel… We have to stop this!!!”

As I said in my last blog, I think the one of the best ways to stop this is by getting this information out to the public at large while educating and getting this information out to the Japanese people is key. Most Japanese citizens do not know about these hunts, that dolphin and whale meat is highly contaminated, and the fact that over 20,000 dolphins and porpoises are being slaughtered every year by Japanese fisherman because the Japanese Government is suppressing this information.

Check out this recent CNN story that shows this firsthand >> Click Here

And remember, even though Taiji continues to receive the most attention where over 2,000 dolphins are killed each year, nearly 18,000 Dall’s porpoise are slaughtered in the brutal Japanese offshore harpoon hunts every year which unfortunately gets very little attention.

I’m not going to rest until we stop all dolphin and porpoise hunting and end commercial whaling but I can’t do it with out your help, so please organize all your friends, family, and classmates and get them to sign our petition and support The Whaleman Foundation and if you haven’t seen The Cove, go see it!